Eureka: "Many Happy Returns"Review

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I see dead people that look like television static.

By Jason Van Horn

In what should be called the Pilot Movie, Part 2 - this week's episode of Eureka takes place immediately after the events of the pilot and continues the story and finally takes it to its ultimate conclusion&#Array;at least for the time being. I don't know for sure. I thought the Perkins story was done last week.The episode begins with patrons of the town of Eureka gathered around a gravesite in the cemetery, where the town is putting to rest Walter and Susan Perkins (Walter died during an experiment and Susan was killed last week by Beverly). After the ceremony, we see these quick cuts of what looks like a being made of television static appearing near the graves. Does Eureka have a ghost on its hands or something else entirely? Back at the station, Jack and Jo are discussing the matter when through the door walks Susan&#Array;who should be dead.Susan can't remember getting killed or even having a son for that matter, which she does considering a little boy was left all alone after the death of both parents. To get help in the investigation, Jack goes to Global Dynamics to try and find a way to test Susan to see what the deal is there. While at Global Dynamics, Jack meets the newest director - Nathan Stark - who also happens to be Allison's estranged husband.Jack heads home for the night, but Fargo has a special project he wants to show to him. Fargo takes Jack to what looks to be a rundown nuclear bomb fallout shelter, but inside, underneath the ground, is a pretty spectacular pad, complete with SARAH (think HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey with a woman's voice and without murder staining its figurative hands). SARAH controls the entire house, meaning it is a smart house and everything is completely controlled by this one central computer.Now, I mentioned HAL for a version specific reason, as I hope - please writers don't do it! - that Eureka will not do the obligatory "house run amok" story that we've seen countless times before. For one thing, by now it has been done so many times it has become a cliché, and I'd hate to see this young show falling back on such laurels to pad its season. For another thing, I don't know how you could rewrite the story any different and justify a new telling. If so, kudos to you, but otherwise I'll watch the previews with a longing sense of dread for the first hint of a smart house gone crazy episode.After running tests on Susan and the recently dug up corpse of Susan, Henry finds that the two are absolutely identical all the way to the molecular core; Henry says they are basically a step above cloning. It turns out that Walter had dabbled in the subject matter and had cloned Susan. Later, back at the Global Dynamics' lab, the static ghost assaults Nathan; Nathan later tells Jack what he saw.

While Allison walks Susan through the streets of Eureka, trying to convince her to be a mother to the other Susan's child, Beverly sees Susan walking around and is flummoxed as to how this person she killed is out and about walking around. After hearing about the static ghost from Nathan and how it messed up the computers, Jack remembers the electrical problems he had at his house when SARAH's settings were reset. Jack goes to Fargo to analyze the security tapes and finds the static ghost had visited Jack while he was sleeping; after slowing the speed down to a frame by frame second count everyone finally sees the static ghost for what it truly is.The static ghost appears at the Perkins' boy's school and comes after him. Allison gets shocked and knocked out trying to protect him, but Jack and the others show up, telling the ghost they can help, and finally revealing the ghost is Henry. Henry is taken back to Global Dynamics and put in a hyperbolic chamber of sorts to help make Henry normal again; turns out the experiment didn't kill him, but rather moved him into another time stream between our seconds.The second episode ends with Jack's daughter - Zoe - moving into his house.First off - the positives. I really like the opening credits, which are these still life montages that are zoomed in on specific imageries that appear completely normal and everyday (like a guy putting gas in his car), but then they move out to reveal something unique and extraordinary (like that gas is going into a hover car). The credits have a nice style to them. The music of this episode was also particularly good, as the pieces used matched up well with the scenes and the emotions the show was trying to convey. For instance, a haunting single piano plinking melody was attached to the more reflective and emotional scenes, such as the young Perkins boy standing at the gravesite of his parents.After only two episodes, I find myself pretty much enjoying the various characters, though Jo at this point I could still give or take; she wasn't as abrasive and stereotypical in this episode, but she still doesn't work for me yet. Jack, Allison, Beverly, and Henry (though some didn't have much screentime this episode) still work well for me and are the reason I'm enjoying the show so far. I don't really remember Fargo from the pilot (maybe they just never said his name) but he seemed like a potentially good comic foil, and the first appearance of Nathan Stark has potential for some quality stories down the pipeline. I specifically can't wait to see how the Jack/Allison/Nathan love triangle goes from here, because so far the writers seem to be setting this up, and talks between Jack and Nathan about Allison have a great bit of chemistry, as you can already tell these two will have some great head butting moments in episodes to come.As for the bad, I didn't enjoy the ghost story all that much. The stuff with Susan and her not wanting a child were the best moments of the episode, but that was just the B-story, and even it had its problems, such as where did clone Susan actually came from. We know she is a clone, but was she living somewhere else and didn't know Walter had another life with another Susan? Upon Susan's death did the clone Susan appear from a lab? We aren't ever given any specifics.And as for the A-story, which dealt with the static ghost, though the ghost design itself was a good visual treat, it was simply way too obvious that Henry would be the answer and episode's final reveal; I had my final conclusion drawn based on the first scene and where the ghost appeared. I wasn't bored or anything waiting for the show to finally lay its cards on the table, but it did ultimately take away a little of my enjoyment since the reveal wasn't surprising or interesting at all, and that is something it should've been. With a ghost story as predictable as this, you need to either A) switch it up and present a unique twist, or B) present the obvious in such a way that it is still compelling; the episode did neither of these things.Making up for the lack of an A-story was the humor, which mostly came from Jack's scenes with SARAH. Moments like SARAH showing Jack all the bathroom reading material he could ever ask for, Jack wanting SARAH to close the bathroom door so he could do his business in private, and the best payoff of them all was Jack standing up SARAH, saying he'd be home for dinner, but instead arriving late to a locked door and a pissed off house who had its feelings hurt; Jack is only able to come in after apologizing like a husband who knows he did wrong.Overall, it wasn't a terrible episode, but it could've been something better with a higher quality ghost story attached to it. The characters and humor are nicely done for the most part, but for Eureka to climb up the rankings it is going to need a few more quality A-stories.